Chapter 20
Night on Gaeth-9 was not night.
The sky remained choked with orbital soot and artificial glare, a false twilight painted in hues of rust and radiation. But in the slave districts, where the Empire's eyes grew thin, shadows stretched long enough for a rebellion to begin.
Kiro crouched beneath a ruptured pipeway overlooking the northern Imperial supply outpost—Outpost C-97, a logistics hub feeding ammo and plasma cores to the city garrisons. Guarded, but not fortified. The Empire never expected slaves to fight back.
They would learn.
Behind him, the first cell of the Ash Rebellion waited.
Dozens of them. Miners, welders, scavengers, waste-haulers. Their tools were crude. A few scrap-blades. A stolen shock baton. Molten iron rods pulled from smelters and wrapped in cloth.
But Kiro had already begun teaching them.
Not how to fight like soldiers.
How to kill like monsters.